


Listen Hard, Maybe You'll Hear Goodbye

by Niji_Hitomi_Iscariot, Silver_Eternity



Series: Life Beyond Death [1]
Category: Bleach, One Piece, crossover - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Death, He comes back, Not Really Character Death, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-25
Updated: 2015-02-25
Packaged: 2018-03-15 04:57:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3434414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Niji_Hitomi_Iscariot/pseuds/Niji_Hitomi_Iscariot, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silver_Eternity/pseuds/Silver_Eternity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first thing you need to know is that everybody dies.<br/>Even the World's Greatest Swordsman.<br/>The second thing you need to know is that life goes on after death.<br/>Both for the ones left behind, and for the World's Greatest Swordsman.<br/>After that, everything's just like it always was.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Listen Hard, Maybe You'll Hear Goodbye

The day that he died started out like any other day. He got up, kissed his cook, trained on the deck for a while, and just after lunch the hotshot who would kill him showed up for a challenge. Looking back on it later, Zoro had to say the fight was one of his better ones. Spark, talent, speed. The kid had them all in good supply. Though after the first couple of years the kid's face had blurred, not memorable enough to stick with him, that blow to the gut though, straight through all the soft tissue behind his haramaki, did.

In more ways than one.

Following the crew proved easier than he'd thought it would be. He even managed to sleep, sort of, in the same bed as Sanji. He never learned whether the cook heard him in the beginning, but he knew the other could sense him. They all could to different degrees. Brook actually held conversations with him, and Luffy treated him like he'd never died. Nami couldn't do either, and she took it the hardest, surprisingly. She spent most of her time avoiding whoever was talking to him at the moment, and was the one to put the most effort into his shrine. It touched him to know that he'd been right about the sea witch; she really did have a heart of gold.

He didn't know how long it took for the pain to start. Years? Months? A decade? He lost track of it with never needing to eat or really sleep. He trained, of course, but only Wado had crossed over with him. She hung on his hip, and berated him in his mind just as Kuina had back when they were kids. So the time passed in a blur until he started feeling hungry. He noticed it first with Luffy, the desire to just reach over and steal the food the captain coveted so badly. But, being Zoro, he shrugged it off. What need did he have for food?! He was dead!

Then he noticed the little length of chain hanging from his chest was getting shorter. He poked at it a few times but before this, it had never reacted, it was just a chain connected to his skin. Now though, every time he touched it, it flared up in agony almost enough to make him stop breathing. Again. A couple of times he nearly got left behind because the chain would throb and the ship would still be moving, but Zoro would be crouched on thin air like Sanji's Sky Walk only stationary.

And for some reason that made it worse. The chain just got shorter when things like that happened.

Until one night when the chain disappeared completely.

He was out on deck, training with Wado in this new Sky Walk thing he'd figured out how to do, when it felt like someone had stabbed him again. Just like the hotshot kid that killed him, straight through the haramaki and all the way out beyond his spine. It was cold, and the wound seemed to bite at him, hollowing his middle out like a mouth on the inside of his belly button. Wado yelled at him, but he was beyond hearing her for some reason. He curled up into a ball, his feet drawn up and shuddering with some unknown fear he didn't have the concentration to place.

Then he exploded outwards, clutching at his face, his spine curved in the opposite direction and his feet kicking at nothing. He might have screamed but the rush of something hard and heavy past his ears made it impossible to tell. For a while, he couldn't see, couldn't breathe, couldn't sense anything, couldn't feel beyond the pain. Even his nose was blocked off. Something burst out of his shoulders, and his fingers felt like claws against the heavy stuff on his head, a tail he knew he had but couldn't remember how he knew thudded against the deck and then against the mast with a loud crash, nearly splintering the Adam wood.

He rolled over, shaking his head to try and clear his vision, and his thoughts, and get that _stuff_ off of his face, but none of it helped. Pushing up to four paws, he roared, thick feline ears slicked back against his neck, and mouth full of dagger-like teeth. His eyes burned when he could see again, and his nose! The scents on the ship were divine! HE'D DEVOUR THEM ALL!!!!

Bursting through the cabin door, the cook shouted something but Zoro couldn't understand it. The words didn't make sense in his head, and he was so hungry! Sanji would fix it; all he had to do was eat him...

A Haki-infused heel clocked him across the muzzle, sending him flying out through the galley until his back hit the mast. Again the Adam wood cracked, and Zoro had to shake his head to clear it. He roared again as a canon ball flew into his side with an explosion of sound and dust. Some part of him screamed internally, but mostly he was confused, why were they attacking?! All he wanted to do was eat them! Then they'd be safe! And they could get stronger! Why! Didn't! They! Understand!

It took a Gigante Hammer sending him out over open water, where he skidded in mid-air, to finally get through to that part of him that was screaming. Another roar that shook the air like thunder and he tore off through some inky black hole in the fabric of space. How it appeared or where it was going didn't really matter, he'd been trying to eat his Nakama... that meant even though they'd fought him off, he was a danger to them, and needed to stay away until he'd figured out just what had happened to him.

The path through the blackness was slippery and confusing- there was no entry and no exit in this strange black space, the place between the realities, with nothing but the white that formed under his feet as he powered onward, never daring to stop in fear he'd turn around and go straight for his Nakama a second time. The hunger in him was no longer hunger- it was a live thing that clawed up his throat and made his jaw snap and snarl in search of something, anything, to fill it. He ran- he ran from his Nakama, he ran from the world of the living, and most of all he ran from what he'd almost done. He ran, endlessly, as if he could escape the roiling beast consuming him if he just ran hard and fast enough.

He ran, right up until he popped out of thin air and plowed face first into white sand.

Then he sat up and looked around. There were twig-trees around him, and sand in his nose, under his paws, sand that shifted and had him sinking into it. But there was something else... an unfamiliar smell that had this beast that now lodged in his belly howling and sent him darting after it. He didn't know what it was... but something told him it was _food_.

It didn't take him long to find it- a hulking, slithery thing with a bulky body and what seemed to be a white shell shaped like a cobra's hood grafted to its head and neck. Zoro leapt for the throat and extended his hands- hands with scythes on them, he found, because instead of choking the beast's neck was slashed wide- and his mouth was burying itself in warm flesh before the thing had even finished giving its death rattle. He didn't stop eating until the very last of the tail was in him, and even then... he was hungry.

But it had taken the edge off, and he was able to stand still long enough to start figuring out what he'd become. He was walking on all fours now, with a long, armored tail for balance, and long, curved claws on hands and feet, all four of which were now paws, feline paws with long stripes in a striking pattern. As most as he could tell, he was some sort of cat. Which made no sense- he was a human when he died, how the hell did he turn into a feline?! It had to be the fault of this awful thing on his face- it had to be!

He could feel it, like a cage on his soul, pressing down on him, hiding him, and he scratched and pushed at it with his back feet, trying his damndest to pry it off his face. It was heavy and annoying and _wrong_ and he wanted it GONE! It refused to splinter even under his hardest blows, and he didn't have time to keep bashing at it before the hunger seized him again and sent him looking for more food creatures... more prey. Luckily, wherever he was now... it seemed plentiful.

Time became a cycle of hunt, eat, and try to break the mask. All others around him were prey, though quite a few tried to fight back, and some even sought him out instead. None survived. The name of the place he learned by overhearing prey he stalked for a while before killing. Hueco Mundo. Nothing he'd ever heard before, but having a name for it made it slightly more understandable. They still became strength in his paws though, no matter how they'd helped him, because eating satisfied the hunger, and satisfying the hunger made him stronger.

Strong enough that eventually, the mask cracked!

Loud, and sharp, like the smack of a winter wind under and around the place. Ironically, it was over his left eye, the one that had been shut for most of his life after training with Mihawk. Now though it saw more than the right. The crack gave him thoughts beyond the hunger, beyond the quest for strength. It gave him hope that someday he could go back to his Nakama and prostrate himself for their forgiveness. Not once after he arrived in the desert did he lapse in judgment like that again, and not once did he ever think back on it without regret.

Over time, though how much he couldn't tell, one crack became two, became a chip, then more chips, then a fracture that stretched from hairline to jaw. It widened every time he fought with it, and the wider it got, the stronger he felt, confirming his initial belief that it was holding him back. Over and over and over he worked at it, chipping away at it bit by bit by bit until all but a ring that covered his left eyebrow and back towards where his ear should have been.

When that finally gave way, it was strange, because he smacked his head against a rock, the mask shattered all the way back to his ear, and everything _exploded!_ Just as it had in pain and coldness before, now it was the release of a pressure valve. His energy expanded around him, flattening trees and powdering rocks, scattering the sand in a huge crater, and when it settled, he was human again.

He shook his head, as though the whole thing had been a dream, and felt the dangle of his earrings, heavier than they had been in life. Some internal knowledge bubbled up that they were what was left of his mask. He poked at them, with an actual finger, and that same knowledge said he'd be in a lot of trouble if he tried to get rid of them. So he shrugged and left them alone. He'd always had his ear pierced before he died; he didn't really see a reason to change it now.

Looking down at himself, he was mildly surprised that the stripes remained on his forearms and legs. A twist to the side gave him a good view that the rest of him was bare though, except for a number, tattooed on his right shoulder just over the curve on his back. He thought it looked like a zero, but from the angle it was a little blurry towards the bottom. He gave a snort and decided to figure it out later, when he wasn't sitting nude in the middle of the desert. Wiggling his toes gave him a sort of childish glee though. Actual human feet, even if they didn't exactly match his living self, and his scars were still there! He was him again! It was elating! Whatever confusion of the new bits and pieces was nothing compared to the fact that he was once again Roronoa Zoro, and as soon as he figured out how to get back to that black non-world with the white path, he could go home! See his Nakama! Make up for having attacked them! He'd do anything as long as he could see his captain and his cook and even the sea witch again.

Now that he was more or less in control of his own faculties again, it wasn't that hard to figure out how to get back to where he belonged. He spent a day pacing, thinking, and then just gave up and _willed_ the black tear to appear, and it did. And as he had the first time it appeared in front of him, he jumped through and started to run, but this time he concentrated on where it was he wanted to go. He wanted to appear on the decks of the Sunny Go, he wanted to see the faces of his Captain, his crew. His Cook.

He missed his cook, an ache as fierce as the hunger that had driven him away, for the roughened sound of his smoky voice and the blue of his eyes that no ocean could match, and he wanted him with a pain that centered in his chest and the back of his throat.

After a much shorter run than the first time, he found himself clawing back the blackness and this time he didn't plow face-first into the deck- though he came close. He caught himself on the railing just in time, only realizing belatedly he probably SHOULDN'T have come naked, but how was he supposed to find clothes when he was dead? Luffy wouldn't care, anyway.

"OI!" his hail echoed oddly—there was something wrong, he felt it. There was something wrong in the air, he didn't know what just yet, but he felt it down to his bones and the too-heavy earrings in his left ear.

Like magic a head popped out around the side of Sunny's mane. The man had a squared jaw, rough with unshaven stubble, shaggy black hair braided into a few twists that hung down around his ears and the back of his neck, and that hat. Older, more sea worn, but no less in love with adventure. Luffy shot an arm out to grab the mast just above a rather familiarly placed metal binding, and slingshot'd himself into his returned first mate.

"OIIIIIII!!!! ZOROOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!"

He was thankful he'd mastered the Sky Walk thing, because Luffy's slingshot managed to get them both skidding out over the open water and the idiot would have drowned if he hadn't been able to keep them both in the air as he walked his Captain back to the ship. "Captain! What the fuck happened to you, you got old! How long was I _gone?"_

"You can Sky Walk!? That's so cool!!!" The captain completely ignored the question in favor of craning his neck—and half his torso—over Zoro's shoulder to stare at the ocean underneath them.

"Yes I can Sky Walk, apparently it's a skill that comes of being dead," he said mock-grumpily, breaking into a jog to catch up with the ship. Damn did it move well in a headwind, even now. It had to have been years, at the least.

"Yosh! Zoro! Sky Walk to Raftel!!" Luffy crowed, and clamored around to perch on the dead swordsman's shoulders, one fist punched into the air and a huge grin on his face.

"No! The Sunny has to go there, Captain, you can't leave your Nakama behind like that," the first mate chided as he came up to the ship and vaulted the railing. "Even if it would mean you get there first."

"But it's right there." Strangely quiet and intense, the Pirate King turned his head towards the rising sun.

In the distance, just on the curve of the horizon was the rise of an island. It was all lit up in gold with the sun behind it, and framed like that was truly beckoning to the pirates on deck. Of which, now that he wasn't being vaulted into the ocean, Zoro could see several he'd never met before. Franky was standing at the wheel, new colors and a new number on his shoulder had disguised him against the backdrop of the bright ship. The dead man had barely a moment to register that there were lights on in the galley before Luffy had his chin in his hand again.

"We've been sailing all night. Usopp saw it just after dinner. Nami says we'll make landfall before lunch." Again that heavy weight under a soft tone. "Think about it, Zoro. I can taste it!"

He hugged him. Hard. There was only one reason there would be unfamiliar pirates on this ship… only one reason there would be people not part of the nine Nakama there had been when he died, and that ached almost as bad as his hunger. "I know you can, Captain. We'll be there, soon. And then... Laboon, and we bring this ship back to Water Seven. Onward, Captain."

He flared his nostrils and took in subtle scents. And the lack thereof. Robin's smell was faded... almost gone, but for the traces on Franky's machinery that would never fade away. Sanji's smell was not in the kitchen and the scent of the food being cooked was no recipe their chef would have made (and the beast that was his hunger and... something else, instinct maybe, snarled and thrashed at the lack of his cook).

His mouth opened and inhaled, drawing the scent over the roof of his mouth. "It's been a long time, hasn't it?"

Luffy jumped down and tilted his hat back to grin up at the taller first mate, "We knew you'd get here when you were supposed to. You always do. No matter how far you get lost. Shishishishishi!"

He smiled a bit lopsidedly. "True. Still, I'm sorry it took so long. Stupid thing stuck to my face took a long time to get off again."

If that made any sense at all to the captain, he didn't comment on it. He just shrugged and sauntered off to His Seat, "S'okay. You're here now. That's the important part."

His departure allowed for Zoro to observe the ship further. If the other Strawhats noticed, they didn't let him know about it. In fact, it seemed as though Luffy's behavior hadn't been out of the ordinary at all. So, either they couldn't see him and just what did that say about their opinions of their captain's sanity? Or, they could see him and were politely not mentioning anything about him being nude or with a gigantic hole in the middle of his stomach. Which also said something about their captain's sanity, because Zoro knew he had to have appeared out of thin air.

A pair of twins, both stocky and with mirrored facial scars hauled on Sunny's mainsail to catch the best of the headwind. The cook was a portly woman who pushed the door open with her hip, and significantly less flair than His Cook, carrying a jug of something spiced and warm in one hand and a stack of mugs in the other.

On the upper deck, Nami was the spitting image of Calliope, though age had touched her the same way it had Luffy. Still, her red hair was wild and barely held back with a familiar black bandanna, wearing practical clothing on the bottom at least and what looked like... was that one of Sanji's shirts around her breasts? Tied up using the sleeves to bare her midrift. Closer inspection revealed Robin's boots and those pants, though they'd been altered to fit her generous hips, Zoro was sure he'd seen Law wear at least twice. Those spots were unmistakable.

She called out, holding a strange hybrid between sextant and log pose, "Forty-five degrees North!"

Zoro tugged Luffy over to Nami. "I need you to ask her if there's any clothes in storage I can have. And my spare haramaki. I have no idea where mine went! And if there's anything in stow I can have, she'll be the one to know."

"Ahhhh—! Why?" Luffy blinked at him as the ship shifted according to Nami's directions. "Is it cold being dead? Can you still poop like Brook?"

"It is a little cold here," it was, he realized with a shudder across his shoulder, the air felt oddly thin (watery, if he had to describe it), "but no, I cannot poop. Or if I can, I don't."

"Geez, you're weird." And at that moment the captain very deliberately stuck his hand through Zoro's stomach.

Then very promptly pulled it out again, "AHHH COLD!!!"

The hand felt like the sword to the gut all over again. Except without the pain, leaving only the feeling of a foreign object somewhere inside him that had him shrieking at the thing that _DID. NOT. BELONG._ The sensation froze him until Luffy pulled his hand out again, and when he did Zoro wrapped both hands around his abdomen and stepped physically apart from his Captain.

"Shitfucking goddamn hell dicklicking fuck!"

That was a curse straight out of Sanji's mouth when the sauce was lumpy, but damn, he was suddenly feeling all kinds of nauseous and violated.

"...Luffy. I think that needs to never happen again," he said weakly, hoping he wasn't as green in the face as he felt.

For what it was worth, the formerly-younger man was shaking his hand and looked ashen-faced. "Ye-eah... no... Zoro's hole is bad."

Nami glared at them both. Not just at Luffy, at them both, and huffed. "If you're going to stand around cluttering up the deck, at least put some damn pants on! Don't think 'cause you're dead I can't charge you for indecent exposure."

"Then give me some fucking clothes, Treasurer! You're the one who knows where the fuck they are and what we got in stock!" He spoke to her directly, arms still crossed over his hole and glaring at her. If she could see him now, why hadn't she said anything when he asked for clothes the first time?!

"I figured if we were playing the Talk Over My Head Game, you could deal with being cold for a couple more minutes." Her eyes danced with that old teasing sparkle again as they dropped deliberately. "It's not like it'll matter much."

He stomped right on up to her the way he always had, uncrossing his arms to put his hands on his hips. "Oi, you know very well you'd owe ME if you stare too long, given you know that's claimed property. But regardless..." his face softened and he reached out, hugging her around the shoulders without pulling her away from the wheel. "I'm glad you can see me, now. I missed you, ya mikan-growing sea-witch."

Nami was thankful for the way he held her, though it wasn't as warm as it had been when he was alive, because it let her meet Luffy's eyes over his back. The captain shook his head very solemnly. They would tell him after they landed at Raftel. If they needed to fight, they'd need their swordsman at the top of his game. Not distracted with the inaccuracy of that claim. So, Nami laughed at him, a little forced.

"HA! As if I'm gonna believe you learned how to manage money since you've been gone. You don't even have pockets, meathead! And you are _not_ shoving my hard-earned Beri up your ass!" But she spared him an arm around the waist, careful to avoid the hole. "Now, go get pants on, and don't get lost on your way to your old room."

Zoro chuckled. "Now if there's one place I CAN get to on this ship, given Franky hasn't rebuilt any of the rooms, I can get to my pants, at least. And spare haramaki. Are we expecting stormy waters?" If so, he'd jam his feet with their too-long nails into his boots just to be sure he kept his footing.

"Barring Gramps or Dragon showing up? Nah, smooth sailing from here to Raftel!" The navigator beamed, even more proud of her craft than she had been the last time he saw her.

"Great, my toes would kill me in my boots. Alright, I'll be dressed and back in thirty," he waved to them both as he disappeared below deck, moving sly and smooth the way he'd learned hunting prey in the desert of endless white sands.

Actually putting ON his clothes, now that was far harder of a task. First he had to actually lay hands on the clothes. Then he had to figure out how to make it... whatever he was, ectoplasm or whatever he was made of now, THEN he had to actually get it on without letting it turn back into fabric. He phased through his pants five times before he got it, though once it was on his body that seemed to do the trick, so for good measure he put on his shirt and bandana as well. Might as well go into this fully prepared, right?

So it was a Zoro that looked almost exactly alike to the day he died that came tromping back up on deck, making the planks shake. The only things missing were Shusui and Sandai Kitetsu. They hadn’t been among any of his things, and hadn’t crossed over with him as Wado had. But he didn’t get the chance to ask about them when he emerged back into the bright sunlight.

"Sweet mother of hurricanes..." Nami gasped, nearly dropping her sextant-pose. "Zoro! It really is you..." She sounded like she wanted to cry.

A thud somewhere near the mast followed by Luffy laughing announced the arrival of the final member of the original crew, and a cursory glance told him that the sniper was out cold on the deck. Apparently seeing the first mate, virtually unchanged in all of the time he'd been away, was more like seeing a ghost than it had been seeing him walking around with a hole the size of his head through his middle. And brave warrior of the sea or not, Usopp was still the one with the most sheltered upbringing.

There was nothing he could do but sit back and laugh, holding his middle as the sound burst out of him, making him go red in the face and his eyes crinkle up. "Oh my god! Did Usopp really just—oh my god! He hasn't done that since before Enies Lobby! You should see your FACES, I'm just me!"

"Zor-bro... it's been over thirty years since we saw you. Think 'Sop's allowed to be a little stunned." Franky snickered, adjusting the wheel with a subtle shift of his shoulders.

With the enhancement of his hearing, the swordsman could pick up the tiny gears and moving mechanical parts that had always been hidden under the cyborg's loud personality.

The shipwright grinned down at him over his shades though, "It's a SUPER new look. Should've let me give you tats before you died though. The ones under your eyes make you look even more like you're glaring than before!"

The dead man paused at that, blinking and his brow furrowing in. "...what tattoos? I never got any tattoos."

He was _dead_ , how was he supposed to hit up a tattooist? But he had to admit, he'd never looked in a mirror in all that time... and thirty fucking years, good seas and skies, it took that damn long to pry that mask off?!

Brook, who'd been happily quiet up to that point, appeared out of somewhat nowhere to hold up a small mirror. "Eye of the tiger, so they say, Zoro-san. Yohohoho!"

He peered into it and swore. Underneath each eye ran a single, tapered stripe, vaguely triangular, that looked like the ones on his forearms and legs- tiger stripes, he recognized. He had fucking tiger stripes on his face. "When the fuck did this happen?!"

"You tell us, bro." Franky laughed along with Brook.

Then there was no more time for talk because the island was upon them, and there were natives--of course there were! And they defended their home against the 'invading' pirates all the way to Roger's Cove, which was a hidden grotto on the lee-side of the island, protected from the churning waters of Reverse Mountain by great, tall cliffs covered in trees of all sizes and colors. Nestled at the bottom of the hill overlooking the cove was a bungalow, the roof was thatched, but painted with the most infamous Jolly Roger on the seas. They'd made it, the One Piece lay somewhere in that house, and it was ripe and ready for the taking as soon as the Pirate King sought it out. The chieftain of the native tribe clapped Luffy on the shoulder as the Strawhat crew looked out over the picturesque vista.

Luffy inhaled deeply, thrust both fists into the air, threw his head back and shouted at the top of his lungs, "ACE! SANJI! ROBIN!! LAW!!! I'M KING OF THE PIRATES!"

Even though he'd known it, even though he'd suspected, hearing Sanji's name and Robin's alone with Ace's hit Zoro hard, and he leaned against the nearest wall to take a few deep, intense breaths. Even the Surgeon of Death was hard to accept, but Sanji... His Cook… He knew it, when he'd set foot on deck and the blindingly hot fire that was the cook's soul was nowhere to be felt or scented, but he'd hoped... he'd hoped he'd founded that restaurant in All Blue maybe, was floating out there on the seas. Even though he knew Sanji would never have left before Luffy made his dream reality.

He straightened back up to keep watch for usurpers. Anyone who'd been following them could swoop in and try to steal this moment. And the dreams of the crew were not yet complete, not fully. His task here was not done until Brook was reunited with Laboon and Sunny made it all the way around the world... all the way back to Water Seven, and Nami's map was in all the major bases as the best, most comprehensive, accurate map ever made.

That task took another six years, the deaths of Usopp, his wife, and the twins whom Zoro never really got to know. By the time the Sunny got back to Water Seven, Franky was almost a century old, and the cyborg was tired. Tired of life, tired of death, tired of running. They used his parts, as per his wishes, to make a new Franky House for the Franky Family just off the entrance to Dock One of Galley-La, and Sunny was decommissioned as a monument to the robotic man who'd made her.

Only after the construction was over did Luffy allow Brook to fill Zoro in on what had happened to the others. Robin had been caught and assassinated after reading the Rio Poneglyph on a small island east of Raftel called the Isle of Doors. Chopper had died heroically in the War of the End, which had been Luffy’s response to Robin’s murder. The musician sang an epic ballad about how the Tenryuubito had fallen, and the way Luffy hadn’t needed to reach Raftel, the pirates considered him their king for the way he rallied them together. He still had of course; it had just taken him another five years to do it because of needing to clean up left over stragglers from the Tenryuubito who cropped up everywhere they turned. After making the symbolic trip though, the Strawhats had sailed on, leaving Roger’s treasure where it was, just as they had this time with Zoro along.

It was in the sea between Raftel and Reverse Mountain that they’d found it. All Blue. And the ruins of the kingdom called Amestris that had been Robin’s undoing. The sea was ringed with a great reef that was a barrier between the Grand Line and the hodgepodge of sea life beyond. Brook said they’d taken the Mini Merry to see it, and once they had, Sanji and Franky backtracked to Raftel for supplies. Then the cook had left them.

“I’ll wait for the shitty marimo to show up and get his things before continuing on with you.” He’d said.

And Luffy had let him.

A few years of sailing with no word from Sanji about Zoro’s reappearance—which made the swordsman squirm a bit to think everyone had been waiting on him—and they simply couldn’t wait any longer. Brook had indeed seen Laboon, but by then the whale was content to wait out the rest of his days at the lighthouse where he’d spent most of his life. Crocus had died while the Strawhats were bringing Brook to his Nakama, but still the whale enjoyed the challenge of the ships trying to enter the Grand Line. So they’d moved on, re-visiting Whiskey Peak, and Little Garden. They stopped at Kureha’s grave on Drum Island to pay their respects and leave Chopper’s hat. Then it was on to Alabasta, once again a thriving kingdom under the gentle but firm reign of Queen Vivi. Brook said they spent the most time there of all, but eventually Luffy’s wanderlust took him, and they made for Water Seven. Once there, Nami's map was published thanks to the combined efforts of Chimney and Mozu's son, who had taken over from Iceburg when the elder of Tom's Sons retired years ago.

Word reached them there that Donquixote Doflamingo had died, and Luffy set out alone to accompany Law in returning the formidable enemy-turned-ally back to North Blue, where his twin brother was buried. Luffy returned alone, and no one had ever gotten the story out of him about what had happened to the Surgeon of Death. Only that he was at peace. Finally.

Once they reunited again, the Strawhats set course for Sabaody, Fishman Island, and the New World, intent on re-visiting all of their favorite places, paying respects to those that had passed on, and seeing if they could be the only pirate crew in history to circumnavigate the world twice in one lifetime. In the process Nami and Usopp invented the sext-pose, which combined the log pose technology with a sextant and compass, and proved to be infinitely more reliable!

As such they had nearly reached Raftel from Fishman Island in less than a year, and that had been when new reached them of the All Blue Baratie.

Approximately six months before Zoro returned, a news coo brought the article. A fire had broken out on the now famous floating restaurant. The report was that all hands had been lost, and that no one could get in to salvage anything, as nothing larger than the Mini Merry could navigate the treacherous reef that was All Blue’s protection from the Grand Line.

Zoro went very quiet at the end of that story. He got up from the galley table, walked out to the deck rail behind it, and wept. He cried for the Nakama who’d fallen in the war. He cried for the men and women who’d ensured that his captain would become Pirate King. But mostly he cried for His Cook. He had no idea where those that drowned went after death, only that he had never met anyone who had while he was away. Part of him wondered if he’d been faster, stronger, could he have saved him. But he knew it futile stewing over it.

It wasn’t all gloom and death though. Somehow, through some miracle that could only be chalked up to the Will of the D and Zoro’s often quoted pet name, Nami conceived a child. That late in their lives, and on the high seas somewhere between All Blue and Reverse Mountain. The kid who’d replaced Chopper couldn’t explain it. But he advised them to find a suitable place for Nami to rest while she was pregnant.

So the Strawhats made for East Blue on what would be their last great adventure.

In the end, Zoro and Brook, the undying ones, were left. Luffy was publically executed, just as Roger had been, and he left a legacy, just like Roger had. Including a little red-headed girl tucked away on an island in the East Blue under the watchful eye of a mayor with a pinwheel on his hat. The Hat went to the new doctor, for being wise enough to know how to handle the impossible. Though no one could really fill in for the little reindeer, he was an excellent doctor, and they all had faith that he'd know the next Pirate King when he met him. Just as Shanks had known when he met Luffy oh-so-many years ago.

So, together, the swordsman and the musician watched the Living World march ever on, the era of their days on the Four Blues waning like the sun.

Until one evening, Brook turned to his Nakama, "Zoro-san."

"Hm?"

They were atop the fountain at Water Seven, watching the day turn to night, and listening to the bustle of the _lives_ below them in quiet contemplation.

"Have you ever heard the legend of the Green Sun?" The musician was wistful; it had been nearly forty years since the swordsman’s death, and it was time.

Zoro tilted his head to the side. "No. Or, it sounds familiar to me, but like from a dream. A long, long time ago, maybe... I don't remember it now."

"The way the old sailors told it back when I was boy, when the sun crossed from this world to the next, a bright green flash would light up the horizon, marking the place where the living could cross into the Land of the Dead." Folding both hands over his cane, Brook hummed. "I think I'd like to go there again."

"...can you still take your soul out of your bones when your body's in salt water?"

"Hai." The other nodded.

"Then let's enshrine your bones with mine in Davey Jones' locker and go find the Green Sun. I know a way to the place I've been, but I... don't think that's the right path for you," the swordsman said quietly. He had a feeling if he took Brook through that black space, he'd never get out, somehow. "We can Sky Walk until we find it. After all... don't we have the time?"

The skeleton took a deep breath, somehow, and climbed to his feet. Though the exposed teeth and empty eye-sockets held no more facial muscles than they ever had since Zoro met him, the energy of a broad smile lit up his face anyway. "One last adventure, old friend. For this world anyway. I'm sure Luffy-san and the others have plenty more for us on the Other Side."

And with that, the pair of them took off for the Green Sun, and the World of the Dead.


End file.
